So when you talk about anxiety just kind of like in the black community, they might be like, oh, you’re not depressed. What is depression?

Depression is different for everybody, in my opinion. So like with my family and stuff like that, everything just stops, like can get out of bed. You don’t have any motivation to do anything. It just stops. And it’s not the best feeling in the world, but it also just tells you to slow down. So it’s good. But as always, it’s just hard for most people to recognize.

How old were you when you first realized you might’ve had anxiety or depression?

I’ve actually sort of noticed it back in high school. I used to run track. I was always nervous like started with nerves and stuff like that. I would always be running in high school and it helped me okay, slow down. Then I started having panic attacks and anxiety attacks. It just took a full-blown turn when my mom died. I was 20 and I was in college. She didn’t get to see me graduate, and I like I had the greatest relationship with my mom; like the relationship that everybody wants with their mom. I was worried about that. It’s just the fact of the matter, I had to grow up. I’m only a child I had.

I’ve been grown up since I was like, yay high. Yeah. And then with my dad, he didn’t know how to cope with losing my mom. My mom had cancer and he didn’t go to any like treatments or anything like that for her. He was always like going and on the go being gone. So I was always at home, like making sure she was ok so she can actually take her medicine. I’m the only one who could get her to keep her medicine down. Unfortunately, when she was gone, my dad didn’t know who he was without her.

Present-day I’m still dealing with it. For the most part. When it’s stressful I call my best friend. I talked to her almost all the time and stuff like that, which is fine, which is why I can cope the way that I cope. She’s not here for all of the events and stuff like that.

The next thing I know everything in life just escalated…. the anxiety and the depression because it’s like, I didn’t take care of everything in the house because my dad does, so I had the buyer, pay the bills or like he would disappear like seven o’clock at night. And like one night he didn’t like come home and I’m freaking out. So I’m like calling everybody and they’re calling everybody trying to figure out where he is. So it was just like losing another parent, after my mom passed away, it’s like I lost two parents. My dad would disappear at nights and I would be like you can’t disappear like that. I was like, I just lost my mom, he can’t disappear like that.

He would turn to drinking and comes home drinking or drunk.

To be honest, I’m sometimes still get angry with my dad. I can get angry about the situation surrounding everything before leading up to like my mom’s diagnosis up to hospice care. It’s still a lot to put on somebody, it’s a constant work. Present day I cope with these feelings by attempting to do something productive and I try to put some of my anxiety and depression into arts or like fashion or something. I also love art and supporting artist. I buy artwork from other artists, I guess sometimes, other people can see your pain better than they can convey it and artwork a lot better than you can. So I get a lot of commission work done.

Coping with difficulty around you

1. Journal, write it out
2. Shift your thought process, really analyze your thoughts and feelings.
3. Talk it out with someone you trust.
4. Surround yourself with positive things, places that are peaceful and of course peaceful people.

Tackle Your Problems

If you’re dealing with a stressful situation, don’t stew in self-pity or waste energy pointing blame at someone else. That just makes you feel less powerful. Instead, it makes sense to:

• Write down the problems involved. On paper, they may seem more manageable than swirling in your head.
• List as many solutions as possible. For now, silence your internal judge. You can reject options later.
• Assess your list. Try asking yourself how you’d like this situation to end. Which options likely will get you there? You also can weigh the pros and cons.
• Accept reasonably good solutions. Research suggests that searching for a perfect option breeds disappointment.
• Once you pick some solutions, break them into reasonable chunks and make a concrete plan. You might set yourself some specific deadlines too.
• Don’t get discouraged if the first solution you try doesn’t pan out. Try another one on your list.

Shift Your Thinking

How you think about a problem affects both how much it upsets you and how well you tackle it. I possible, it pays to shift your mind away from negative thoughts or excessive worries. Try these suggestions:

• Ask yourself how realistic your worry is. Our imaginations can take us into situations that may never develop.
• Set aside “worry” time each day. Then whenever a negative thought intrudes, tell yourself to wait until the set time. You may feel better by then.
• Focus on the good aspects of your life.
• Look at tough times as an opportunity to learn, grow or improve your situation. Maybe you’ve seen how supportive your friends are or learned how strong you can be in a tough time.

Site reference for source

https://www.mhanational.org/deal-better-hard-times